


This is our Tuesdays

by RaspberryDawn



Category: Smosh
Genre: Asexual Character, Body Dysmorphic Disorder, Codependency, Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, Eating Disorders, F/M, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Insomnia, M/M, No Smosh AU, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Acceptance, Self-Esteem Issues, Support Group AU, maladaptive daydreaming, pathological liar
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-19
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2018-07-25 11:25:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 20,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7530916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaspberryDawn/pseuds/RaspberryDawn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a world without the Smosh media group existing, a very strange group of individuals occasionally get together and talk about their issues centering around self esteem mostly.  In a hospital on Tuesday nights there's a conference room with a sign pointing inside, and at some point, they've all taken that step in. This would be a chance to peek at their lives.</p><p>Entirely an AU, and full disclosure but the pairings are not really solidified, and this is what I'd refer to as a living, breathing, changeable thing at any moment. Will cover a myriad of mental issues that may make some readers uncomfortable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Shayne

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think the disclosure in the summary covers a lot but, yes, so far the plans are basically past Marhinki/current Courthinki; current FlitzMari, ShayneNoah, you know, who knows, I have this mapped out but things are subject to change. Especially since this was originally conceptualized as a series of loosely connected one-shots and now it's a fucking multi-chapter project apparently.
> 
> 'But what about those 3 other only-ShayneNoah fics you've promised us' I'LL GET TO THOSE STILL AT SOME POINT I AM SO SORRY.
> 
> A lot of this stuff as said, I have mapped out about characterization, and the tags may end up changing as things come up in the story. This likely will center around you know, the support group meetings where a character will be focused on, interjected with smaller chapters about personal lives outside it. So points-of-view will stay third person but will change because I can't help that and this isn't some literary masterpiece.
> 
> So um, enjoy, leave any comments, questions, suggestions, what even have I done. 
> 
> Again y'know. AU. Names are kind of changed, professions are different, life paths may have gone different ways. Just expect that. Also Joe's here so expect that too.
> 
> Noah is the latest to attend these meetings - and here we go.

It was a Tuesday night, and Noah Grossman could think of a million other places that he would rather be. After all, to park his car in the parking garage at the hospital and to wander around when the sun would be going down soon was something that seemed a bit creepy to him. His parents had said goodbye to him before he left, almost in a way that was much too supportive. He felt a bit anxious as he walked down the halls with the fluorescent lighting hitting him sharply. Some of the lighting, in fact, was turned off in places. It was like he wasn’t supposed to be here.

Still, he persisted and kept holding tightly on to the piece of paper that he had in his hand. It gave a number and name to a conference room, and he made his way the best he knew how. The tall thin boy was afraid of tripping over his own shoes as he walked, but instead of running away like he felt that he should, he was almost there. 

The first few rooms he could see into were entirely dark, and they weren’t the right ones anyway. Once he turned the corner though, he could see a sign on the floor with an arrow pointed to lure people inside as light from within flooded out into the hallway. 

As he got closer, there were two voices, and it didn’t seem like they were distressed or anything. A good sign. Still, he was nervous just to high heavens given the fact that he’d never done anything like this before. He had brought a composition book and pen with him, which he used to take the paper he held to place it in there. His doctor had talked the nineteen year old’s parents into pressuring him to come, and now he was plain screwed. 

Walking in the room, he passed by the sign stating ‘Support Group’ simply on the door in bold, large letters. It looked exactly like the scene of a movie, except no one was there hardly. 

There was multicolored carpet on the floor, off-color white walls, and blue plastic chairs sitting in a haphazard circle. It was pretty much like any other hospital conference room he'd seen, though he hadn't seen very many. 

There was a man of average height with dark hair haphazardly spiked looking vaguely professional with a polo shirt on, holding a clipboard and his chair turned to talk to the man beside him. Really, without the clipboard, he wouldn’t look the least bit professional. 

Next to him, the guy had dirty blond hair hanging over his left eyebrow with the length of his bangs but it was shorter elsewhere. He wore a cranberry v-neck, and right on top of his pec was a nametag reading ‘Shayne’. His body seemed very, very nicely defined, and very muscular, though he seemed sort of short.

The moment this guy looked up to him, Noah purposely turned away as the other two guys got quiet. Noah found himself looking at a table with white plain name tags with markers beside them, some donuts, and coffee available with some accompaniments. 

He grabbed a name tag, actually scribbling ‘Noah’ on it before he grabbed a styrofoam cup to fill with sugar, a little cream, and even some coffee as well. His hands were shaking a bit, but he managed to do this without any major fucking up. Walking over to the two guys, he sat on the opposite side of the dark haired one, noticing he didn’t wear a nametag. 

Noah set his coffee on the floor near him for a moment, so he could rest his notebook in his lap and take the tag. He peeled the back off and stuck the tag to his shirt. 

With attention focused on him, the man next to him began to speak.

“Hey, hi there. So you’re Noah. My name’s Joe, I help run things. So this is your first time coming?” 

This ‘Joe’ character had scruff on his face, a bit more than an afternoon shadow. Noah nodded, and he picked his coffee back up.

“I’ve never done anything like this.” Noah managed to stutter out, a confident smile on his lips that was lying about not being nervous. He put the coffee to his lips, and that was when the other man spoke up.

“Are you anorexic?” 

There was an uncomfortable staleness that came in the room, Noah kind of looked down at this own body, which granted was quite visible skinny even if he wore an oversized shirt. 

As he opened his mouth to defend himself, Joe spoke up instead.

“I told you last week, Shayne, you can’t ask things like that!”

“Why not?”

“It sounds hostile, and makes people uncomfortable.” 

“I was just curious.”

“Yeah, well, you can’t be curious aloud in a support group.”

 

While they were having their own little moment, Noah finally spoke up for himself. It came out as a quiet little croak, but he cleared his throat and spoke louder.

"I'm not, though. I'm not anorexic."

"See? I didn't offend him."

There was an exasperated look on Joe's face, like he had seen too much shit. Noah was shaking his head with a paled face. It was true, he hadn't been offended. Was he bothered when everyone accused him of an eating disorder? Only a little, but only because they accused him of one he didn't have.

"It's actually the truth, I have something else."

The look that Joe gave him was just a little tired, though he seemed like he'd normally be a happy guy. 

"Don't encourage him."

Shayne just brushed his hand absentmindedly in the air, setting it down on his knee when he was finished and leaning forward. 

Things may have been a little awkward feeling right now, but Noah reached out to take his notebook and tap his pen against it. Surely, other people would soon be here.

"It's about time, isn't it?"

"Almost. You two came a bit early."

The sun was only beginning to start a descent below the horizon, and at that time that Noah was staring out the window another man came in. A hand raised in good will, a booming 'hey', and Noah turned to noticed the other two men raising a hand to say hi as well.

"So have you seen any good ghosts lately, Joven?"

"Oh no, not lately, there was some promise at a site last Friday but nothing."

Noah just took it in stride and pretended to know what they were talking about. Or, at least like it wasn't strange. 

"Did you speak to them in English? One of the things is stuff like that, you know, you guys go in and you try speaking English to ghosts in a castle in Germany from the 1500's and I don't think they spoke English."

This guy Joven just smiled with rather sarcastic intentions in his look, applying his own nametag and grabbing a donut before sitting at one of the plastic chairs a bit away from them. 

"We had someone who spoke Spanish."

"Was it the same kind of Spanish they spoke back whenever?"

His face froze only a second before he shrugged, taking a bite of the donut. "I don't know? Should have been? Has Spanish changed so much? It wasn't that old."

The pieces of the puzzle came in to place a little bit as they spoke and joked around. This new guy, though he had another strange name, had a little bigger than average build with dark hair, thick rimmed glasses like Noah himself, and a messenger bag and camera bag slung around his neck. 

Surely it was going to all be a well adjusted group of people, Noah decided.

He started to watch the door a bit more though, and soon enough after the new guy another one followed. With a leanly muscled frame, chestnut colored hair that nearly curled under his chin, he was holding a small bag of candy - and he was quite tall.

"Damn it, Wes, I thought you said you were going to the bathroom."

"And there was a vending machine near it! A--oh, hi there! Someone new."

"Yeah, hi." Noah murmured, just barely looking up.

"Hey, I'm Wes. Nice to meet you."

"That's my roommate, and he's an overgrown child." Joven helpfully pointed out, but Wes' smile did not waver in the least. He just slapped on his own nametag and sat closer to Joven. 

When Noah glanced to Joe and Shayne for some kind of guidance, Shayne made a half-hearted obscene gesture to imply they were gay, and then shrugged, to insinuate a 'probably gay' way. If they weren't, Shayne wasn't sure how many people could put up with Joven.

"Mari's not here yet?" 

Wes asked sincerely, noticing the bareness of the room as well. 

"Keith shows up whenever he wants, but usually the girls are here and Lasercorn is always early with Amra."

For a moment Noah thought more people were going to have normal names, but the mention of someone named 'Lasercorn' was… ...well, that couldn't even pass as a name. He hadn't heard the name Amra before, but Lasercorn definitely was not a name.

"So are we just going to start without them, or?"

"Start without me? That hurts, Shayne!"

The voice from the doorway was so loud it was jarring, and the tone was accusatory which made Noah nearly jump a bit. When he looked over he saw a guy with bright orange hair, and it was just a little shocking to say the least. He was quite pale but that only made the dark circles under his eyes more prominent. 

He went to get his own coffee, but following after him was a tall thin black guy, quite nicely dressed with a patterned hoodie on and a red hat with a pattern even you could see hidden under the rim. He had a pretty great smile too, but he didn't bother with the nametag and he just sat at one of the chairs. 

In a moment he looked rather serious though, nodding over to Joe and taking in his surroundings by the look of it. By the time the other character of a guy came over, he had crudely drawn on his tag a rather fat unicorn with some sort of block on it's back shooting a beam.

There wasn't even time to dwell on that before two girls walked in, one with long black hair in a braid and as small as could be as a person while accompanied by a girl who was also Asian with her hair in a braid, yet her hair was a chalky dark red. 

Obviously it seemed as if most people in the room were acclimated as good friends. Maybe that was like some testament to the beacon of hope this place could be. It could be a good thing, but that would all depend on the people here.

Half of the attention though seemed to go to the two ladies who entered, but Noah noticed two more people entering the room. A blonde girl with thick hair and short jean shorts, and who looked like a sulky older man beside her.As everyone focused on their own thing, he noticed the moment they came in the room together their hands had been clasped together but they slipped them apart and went their separate ways. The blonde to sit down and the male with short dark hair to grab coffee.The blonde to sit down and the male with short dark hair to grab coffee.

 "Keith may be a while if he shows up, we can start without Keith."

Joe stated, and everyone slowly meandered around to take a seat. Quite a few of the cheap plastic chairs were filled now, but Noah tapped his notebook and just looked around. Noah jumped a little again as he noticed the guy with the orange hair staring right at him, almost in a threatening way.

There was reassurance though, sort of, not really, when the Amra fellow spoke up.

"He's harmless."

This seemed again like an insult to the guy, so Amra spoke again.

"He really is."

"I don't know why you'd say that, I know five ways to kill a guy with my thumb."

"Alright, Lasercorn, chill, we're going to start out." 

Joe stepped in to say. There was no way Noah wanted to start, so maybe he should not have sat right next to the guy running things. 

"My name's Joe, and we're all here for our own things, but we're just going to sit here and talk about what's on our minds and how we can correct behaviors that may not be… very productive, and turn them into good things. So we'll start to my right, go around and introduce ourselves, say a little if you want. We do have a new person here tonight."

To his right - so that would start with Shayne. Noah took an internal sigh of relief and just clung to his notebook as he looked around.

Shayne leaned forward and sat his arms across his legs, looking around the group with a quite attractive smile to go with those steel blue eyes.

"Hi. Hey guys. I'm Shayne To--"

"Only your first name."

He was quickly corrected, and though he gave a glance to Joe he continued on.

"So, okay, my name is Shayne - Toe. Toe is my last name. How about that. Anyway! So I'm just here to have a good time."

"Do you maybe want to say a bit about yourself?"

"I'm a virgo, I'm 24, and I just love telling bad jokes during long walks on the beach."

Everyone else seemed to take the joking, but Joe was just weary.

"A bit about why you're here."

"No, thanks, maybe later."

"Alright, for everyone who doesn't know, this will be Shayne's… fifth time here without really saying much. That's good, that's fine, you can open up in your own time. That's fine. So… Next."

They were a few seats away, but next was the guy with all the gear around him sitting next to the friendly one who was quietly eating from the bag of candy he had. 

He pushed up his glasses before he began to speak, and he had an air of importance and self confidence to him that seemed a bit faked.

"Everyone can just call me Joven, I mean, you guys know that. So, I'm a paranormal investigator. It's really fun, I love my job, and no one takes it seriously."

The note of bitterness at the end was something that Noah took notice of, but again, this being a support group - he maybe needed the support for that so why be so quick to judge him? It was mainly the banter from everyone, between everyone, that as the new kid he was not quite used to.

"Okay. And Wes?"

"I'm Wes, yeah. You kind of stole my thunder there! I'm just, well, kind of self esteem issues, I guess. We'll get into that."

He looked a little comfortable even bringing up his own issue, but Noah noticed that maybe his presence of being there would be alarming since they all obviously knew one another somehow.

The shorter guy next to him seemed just even shorter considering Wes was so tall, but Noah noticed he had a tag too that he must have got when Noah must not have paid attention. Maybe the blonde girl had grabbed one for him.

"Yeah, I'm Matt, it's nice to be here for about the 200th time."

His voice wasn't a deep baritone, but it was a completely flat deadpan. 

"You got some coffee, Matt, when was the last time you slept though?"

Matt pulled a face at the question and smirked a bit, looking at the cup.

"This morning, actually. I slept a whole four hours, that's four more hours than yesterday. We should just celebrate my success and not punish me for hydrating."

"Coffee isn't hydrating," the orange haired guy spoke up, but around the room there was some half hearted clapping. Even orange haired guy just clapped. 

"Thank you."

Matt stated, though from his posture and body language it had probably been a joke anyway. He turned to look at the girl with the black braid, ceding the conversation to her.

"Hi! I'm Olivia, and I just really actually am glad to be here, it's helped a lot with the anxiety and everything."

Finally, someone said something that seemed a bit more serious to Noah. He kind of nodded, listening along. 

"And for the uninitiated, I'm not related at all to Mari."

There was a glance over to the other Asian girl by Noah, because who else could she have meant? It was directed to him, too, but Noah had not even had the thought cross his mind.

"Okay, a little off topic at the end there, but we'll talk about how you've been working to feel a bit better, okay?"

"Yeah, alright."

The blonde next to Olivia slouched in her chair, sitting with her legs open and arms crossed. Her crop top was actually rather cute, Noah thought, and things continued on. 

"Well, yeah, my name's Courtney, and I have like, 20 siblings. That's not enough to give anyone a complex or anything. But it kind of did and so I'm here. Yo."

Next to her, with the red hair, the next girl spoke. 

"I'm Mari and I'm not a boy. That's all."

"Beautiful, beautiful way with words, Mari." Joe encouraged, but Mari shrugged and turned to the person next to her.

"I'm Amra and I'm here to make sure this guy's okay." He pointed to the guy next to him, who looked ready to protest again but just shrugged it off and nodded in acceptance. 

Things were moving a bit quickly, and Noah was nervous and looked at his watch. There would be more of this, probably.

The only person next was the orange haired guy, who pointed to the drawing on his name tag to explain his name.

"You can call me Lasercorn, and just ignore that guy, I've never seen him in my life."

Everyone seemed to take anything he said in stride, so Noah tried not to think much of it. They were all quietly doing their own things still while they looked at Lasercorn with almost glazed-over eyes of having heard of it all so often.

"He's a pathological liar."

Joe helpfully butted in.

"You can't prove that."

"So that tattoo of a unicorn with a laser attached to it, you actually have that? Do you want to just show us one day, then?"

"I do have it, but no, no thanks." 

Joe nodded, before turning to Noah with a gentler look. Noah took a drink of his coffee, because he suddenly felt quite nervous about having to speak. At least the coffee helped his suddenly dry throat.

"My name is Noah and I'm not anorexic." He cast a glance to Shayne, who just raised both eyebrows. "So, lately, the doctor said I have like, 'selective food intake disorder'. I eat, I eat a lot, but none of it has like… nutrients. So they said maybe something like this would be good for me, and my parents kind of convinced me."

"Your parents? How do they tie in to your recovery?" Joe asked with a concerned voice, curious. 

"I'm nineteen, and half Jewish, so the guilt is real."

Across the room came someone speaking out.

"Cool, I'm Jewish too." 

Noah gave a peace sign to Matt, who the comment had originated from.

"Well, that's good, Noah, thank you so much for sharing. That's a lot, it's good for your first time even speaking."

He nodded, accepting the comment half heartedly.

"So, what is that even?"

Olivia asked, but Noah didn't mind, No one seemed to have heard of it much, so he explained a little of his usual spiel. 

"It's when, you know, it's not being a picky eater, but it kinda is, but most people grow out of it as a kid. I drink like, pepsi and coffee, I'll eat cheese pizza and finish a full bag of chips, so I definitely eat, like, a lot. Sometimes just thinking of eating of other stuff though will make me almost sick."

"So like, eating natto?"

The question came from Amra but Noah just had to shake his head.

"Never heard of it."

"Okay, you'll scare him away and he'll never come back. Let's give Noah a little rest and just kind of open things up here to the floor."

There was silence as everyone looked around at one another at first. Noah was judging the reactions from other people, and they seemed surprised when it was Shayne who said something.

"I can talk, I guess."

It was at that moment that another guy walked in instead, wearing an even fancier hat than the one Amra had on. It was red with fake stones on it, a red jacket as well as he took the seat between Lasercorn and Amra. He was African American too, and just cursory glanced around the room. Noah gave him a look of relief, at least someone else seemed younger like himself.

"Hey Keith."

It came from Joe and there was a smattering of other people saying hi as well, but Noah noted the way Keith just opened up to smile and laugh kind of as he looked at Shayne.

"Hi, am I late for him to practice a new monologue on us?"

There was kind of a shrug from the dirty blond haired guy, who just feigned a look of offense. 

"No, no, I'm actually going to talk."

Keith nodded and most people's attention turned back to Shayne as he sat up straight.

"Anyway, so, you may see me and look at me and think 'oh, this guy is Adonis, he just is beautiful, he's perfect, he probably doesn't even need to try because he just looks great."

There were some skeptical looks around the room, Noah noticed, but it was clear that while none of them exactly happened to be unattractive that Shayne just was a bit desirable. Not just his looks, but his demeanor as well. 

"Yeah, well, so underneath my shirt though, I am terribly, horrifically deformed."

The look on his face lost any sort of comedic tone to it. He appeared to be looking away at the cream colored walls instead, in fact. The silence seemed uncomfortable and loud, but it felt like someone should say something and nobody was. Noah decided to make the bold and probably stupid move of speaking up.

"Did something happen?"

Shayne just kind of gave him a strange look, while others around the room were giving Noah a clear wide-eyed stare. Joe seemed to allow it though, but Noah definitely sunk down in his chair a bit. He could hear near him that it was likely Keith who muttered out a small 'no, dude'. 

"Yeah. Yeah, I had surgery to get my appendix out. Um, they cut from like... " He motioned with two fingers, tracing an area where he knew the cut to be, closer to his hips. "...There to there. And I had an infection, so they opened it back up again. After they finished it up, it was really red and started growing really big."

His head was bowed a bit, and Noah just grimaced even without the knowledge of what he was going to hear soon.

"So as an actor, how have you dealt with this, Shayne?"

Joe seemed genuinely concerned now, and Shayne just squinted his eyes and looked around.

"I cut it off."

"What." The exclamation came from across the room, from Courtney. The guy afflicted though seemed to take it in stride.

"It was after I worked out so much and gained muscle but that didn't even help. Yeah, it was really raised and so I took a razor and - it didn't work. It looked worse and I talked to a surgeon and they tried some radiotherapy whatever, but it's still there and some people say it's not as bad. But it's still there, and when I saw another surgeon, they just flat out told me 'you can't remove scars'."

Noah was not really used to hearing this kind of stuff, as in, the mental struggles of anyone. He himself didn't even think he had a problem, but he had promised to come to at least a few meetings. This obviously would be more heartbreaking than he thought.

"And how do you deal with it?"

"I don't take any scenes where they want my shirt off, but that's like, most of them it seems. I don't even take it off when I go swimming, I dress before I see the mirror after taking a shower, I use skin bleach, skin creams, skin oil vitamin stuff, like it takes a good two hours to go anywhere and even then I'm not happy. I think about it all the time."

The last sentence just trailed off into a sort of sadness. There was some people shaking their heads, but Noah decided to look down and just think about the intensity of what was said.

He had tried to cut it off. He tried to cut a scar off. He did, in fact, by his inference, cut off his own scar. Just after that even, he was not happy with the results still. Even after some sort of surgery and then being told surgery wasn't even an option.

Wes spoke up a little quietly from the other side of the ring of chairs.

"Well, you. You kind of have to work with what you have, right?"

"I - I do, and I try, it doesn't mean I have to like it."

Two hours daily on a scar that bothered him, avoiding mirrors…

"It's a ten and a half centimeter slash of horrific, unbearable agony every day I have to live with."

Honestly Noah wasn't sure how exactly long that was, he'd left high school at the beginning of the previous year and had shoved most knowledge of those kind of things away. Still, it seemed important to him.

"You can cover it up, though."

Keith stated, and oddly enough it made Shayne kind of nod and shrug again, as if he wasn't sure the issue he was concerned and talking about was really rather serious or not. Beside him, Amra leaned his elbow on his knee, his fist closed and holding his chin up as he peered curiously across the room.

"What about seeing a psychologist for it?"

"Yeah, nice try, I'm coming to a support group instead for a reason."

It was the first experience Noah ever heard of someone with Body Dysmorphic Disorder, and he didn't even know the name of that existed. Hearing someone attractive talk about how no, actually though, they were horribly deformed - it was a bit frightening. He just kept replaying with vivid imagery in his head how so flippantly someone could admit to trying to - what would it be - mutilate themselves? Would a scar even bleed if removed?

Everyone else around seemed genuinely concerned though, and Shayne kind of sat back and non-verbally cued the room that he was done talking for now. 

"Okay, let's not play twenty questions with him, but thank you for sharing Shayne."

Joe's statement was met with a moody teenager-like stare by Shayne but everyone else seemed interested and impressed. It seemed though that time moved much quicker after that. Olivia did speak a bit about how the anxiety she felt was getting better - she didn't feel so much like people were laughing at her, but she didn't explain or go into why she'd think anyone was. 

Joven even made some conversation about her, about feeling happier with himself but his family still disapproving of what he was doing. Mari made a comment that could have easily been seen as joking at his expense, but no one made any sort of deal about it, even Joven who just made some defensive comment before letting go of it.

A lot of what was going on, Noah didn't really know what was happening. He was offered the opportunity to speak again and he kind of turned it down, deciding to stay quiet and listen. Lasercorn occasionally had quite colorful comments he threw out, but it was the kind of things that made Noah question his motives and character.

He'd have to come back to get more acclimated, he decided.

They ended up wrapping things up, and there was a bit of slow settling things together as people began to take a stand and move over to talk to others. This is where he felt a bit alone, but Joe clapped a hand on his back before going to speak with Shayne. He was just going to quietly take his exit before someone walked up to him.

"Hey man, I didn't catch your name."

It was Keith, and he could recall that even without the other having a nametag since it was one of the more normal names.

Noah pointed a slender finger awkwardly to his name tag, smiling a bit.

"It's crazy here, huh? Everyone's just crazy."

Keith spoke, and Noah let out a little laugh. It seemed almost inappropriate to laugh at, but you had to roll with the punches right?

"Interesting, at least."

"So will you be coming next time?"

He really couldn't think of a reason not to - at least it could occupy his time. 

"I guess."

"Cool, maybe we can get to know one another. Man, it's not even bad around here, but you kinda have to know what makes everyone tick. A while back if Mari had said that to Joven, it wouldn't have been pretty."

"I did get that vibe, a little."

"It's like a weird family, and now you can be part of it."

Noah glanced over to the guy named Matt and Courtney, again who were leaving together, shoulders brushing as they walked out and Matt with another, different cup of coffee in his hands. 

"Uh - yeah, I guess." He again laughed a little, just bowing his head shuffling a bit.

"It helps. At least you know you know, there's a place where people don't care about what's going on with you, but they care about you."

The look on the brunette's face was genuine as he just accepted this. Keith seemed pretty cool so far, though he didn't know much about him. As Shayne walked past them though, the shorter guy suddenly stopped and turned toward them both.

"Do you really only eat cheese pizza?"

Shayne asked Noah, who nodded along.

"Kind of, almost. Just about."

"Cool. See you next time?"

Noah nodded, the images still in his head about the sort of things the blond had said. Shayne just raised an eyebrow, nodded his head and took off.

Keith himself jerked his head to the door, and they began to walk together. 

They kept speaking together even as they got out into the darkness outside of the hospital.

Very much so, it had been an interesting first time.


	2. Shayne & Noah - Outside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Noah's barely had time to process everything yet, when he walks in to a shop and comes across Shayne. And, well, why not talk a bit? Probably because generally you're not supposed to, but Noah doesn't know that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my shift was so incredibly slow that I wrote this during it, and just finished it up, like I mentioned last time it's basically though the part where - there are larger chapters comprising of group therapy, and smaller more personal chapters maybe focusing on a few people, a ship, y'know, whatever, outside of the group therapy.
> 
> it means a lot of these smaller chapters (which will have central character names and 'outside' as the chapter title because I refuse to come up with original titles) COULD really TECHNICALLY be optional, but then if you miss out on some foreshadowing or character development I warned ya
> 
> that is um. still the plan. 
> 
> and I forgot if I mentioned it but if you wanna know where Ian and Anthony are in this terrible fictional world: I'd like to tell you and there is plans for them and they will show up eventually sometime but in the meantime no, do not expect them to be central characters. everyone else? everyone else are central characters. cool thanks

Really, although it seemed as if so many people in the group knew one another, Noah didn't expect himself to be running into anyone he had previously met so soon. It happened rather innocently, too, all he did was head in a coffee shop he didn't normally visit when he was coming back from his afternoon class. 

Sitting at a table near the counter was Shayne, in a green polo shirt and his head in his hands as he looked down at a small notebook he had open. He was occasionally writing something, which Noah just observed for a moment before he looked up to the counter and noticed no one was running it. Maybe it was just something about this place with sort of dim lighting, but he couldn't figure out if anyone was actually around.

Part of him wanted to turn and run though, not ready to deal with facing someone he had just met in what seemed like a clinical setting. The other part - well, besides Keith that he had spoken with, it seemed like it could maybe be a bit of a safe bet that even if he'd seen Shayne bare his heart two days ago that the other would be amicable.

Since no one was at the counter to take his order for a coffee anyway, he slung his backpack off his shoulder and sat it down on the seat across from Shayne. There was the unspoken set of rules he hadn't heard of about not really seeking others outside of treatment, but Shayne just glanced up at him.

'Hey."

So far, so good. The dirty blond haired guy just nodded to him, looking up, but Noah pulled the chair out and took a seat. He looked around a bit - there were quite a few pastries on display in cases, but he turned and looked back away.

"What are you writing? Do you go to school near here too?"

Noah asked, prying a bit. He fumbled in his pocket for his phone and set it on the table, sadly noting the cracked screen he had yet to get fixed.

"School? No, oh God, no. I'm not in school anymore. What, do you--" there was a look of confusion and almost slow realization on his face, "--do you go to that high school near here?"

It made him break out laughing a little. He could see how that could be a mistake, sure, some people even told him he looked 12 even if he'd insist he was 19 - because he was 19. So, he grinned and shook his head.

"I'm in college. Promise. I finished high school last year, and this is my first year. I'm a theater major."

There was almost a look of sudden admiration, and the other just looked over at Noah. 

"So a theater geek kid."

"Well, they call it that, but, really it's more for acting… stuff… Like, not just theater."

Shayne took a drink from what looked like some green tea in a clear cup, tapping his pen against the pages before setting it down.

"So, you want to act? This is California, welcome to the dream I guess."

"I..." He almost stated that he had acted, quite a bit, even a role in a sitcom that was short lived but he had a decent resumé and everything. His senior year of school he'd just taken a little time off, and again now he was in school he was taking time off, but in a way it was true. The dream was always to go bigger. "Well, yeah. I suppose so, yeah."

"Anyway, so you followed me in here or something? That's not really necessary."

Taken aback, Noah looked equal parts of confused and a bit terrified before Shayne just laughed, showing a beautiful set of teeth. After an exhale, Noah began laughing too.

"I have this exam I have to study for, I was just going to get a pick me up before going home. It doesn't look like anyone's here though? Did they go in the back?"

"They have shitty service here, I don't know." 

Shayne mused, taking another sip of his drink. 

There was a quiet moment between the both of them, and Noah picked up his phone, not seeing any new notifications or messages, before he turned the phone back over on the table. 

"So…. That Joven guy. He really does the whole ghost thing?"

"You're not really supposed to talk about things you hear there outside of there, or even really acknowledge each other if you see someone, but you are new. I mean, so I'll tell you yeah, he really actually does. Or thinks he does. Well he does, but the whole 'are ghosts even real' thing is a factor. He has a job with a television show about it and I'm sure they all think it's very real, so yes he has a real ghost thing, that's not imagined."

Noah just tilted his head, taking in all the information that he heard. He even leaned a bit closer to Shayne across the table, his eyebrows furrowed as he looked down at the table digesting what was said.

"And you really think he's gay?"

"Pfft." Shayne sputtered an uncaring sound out, scratching his own forehead. "I don't know, it's not my business or anything. But he does live with Wes, they're constantly in a state of fighting or being lovey, well, Joven being more fighting and Wes being more loving but that's just personalities. I don't really know."

"What does Wes do?"

"I just said you're not - okay, uh, he's an editor, for that thing Joven's on. That's how they met, probably. I only know that because I saw his name I think in the credits the one time I ever watched that show."

"He just edits in the ghosts or something then, right?"

"Fuck, probably. If ghosts existed anyway, wouldn't more people be haunted by stuff like dinosaur ghosts? What about being a hunter and just being haunted in return by the ghosts of all the animals you killed? It's always some girl in a white dress with a tragic backstory though."

"It's because animals don't go to the afterlife. They have their own thing going on. Something like that."

Shayne looked incredibly contemplative for a second.

"You mean the whole 'they have no souls' type thing, right?"

"Well, no, they have souls, if I remember that right, or like, some of them do or something, but like - okay, imagine the afterlife and now imagine every single mosquito or flea or whatever there too. Not really that pretty anymore." 

"I… guess not."

"It's like, you eat kosher and it's because a rabbi is there to watch the whole process to make sure it's done right. Because if you mess up slaughtering it, you're condemning it again, because it may have actually been the vessel for someone's soul who was a sinner who it's their last step to move to the afterlife."

After a moment of silence after Noah fumbled to explain himself from what he could cobble together of having heard people say in the past. He wasn't exactly clear on it himself, but he knew according to his faith the answer was somewhere in what he just said.

That didn't help any confusion though.

"You just said 'kosher' and 'rabbi' but you sound like you're describing some Buddhist-Jewish kind of possible cult, or something. You entirely lost me."

Noah put his face in his hands, pushing his glasses up as he went ahead and laughed. His face was quite expressive with even his own disbelief or confusion showing.

"I haven't been to temple in uhm, a while, and it's not like we just always discussed dinosaur ghosts. But I guess - since dinosaurs and humans didn't coexist, dinosaurs probably wouldn't be ghosts."

There was a bit of silence, so Noah decided to just keep talking.

"I'm only half Jewish, I don't know. Some of the stories about spirits are cool though, I guess, like the - the dybbuk, this like, evil spirit caught between worlds. Golems are also some… ...some… I'm sure you know what they are."

He stopped speaking, but when he moved his hands and rearranged his glasses he noticed that it looked as if Shayne was contemplating something. With his head tilted to the side, he spoke.

"The first thing, the what, the?"

"Dybbuk?"

"Yeahhh, that was in some horror movie too, right? Michael Bay did it, and like, even with Gary Oldman and Idris Elba. Some just… Generic horror movie, but a Jewish twist."

Noah shook his head. He hadn't heard of it, but lately he was finding out there were a lot of things he hadn't heard of. 

"Maybe. I'm pretty sure, I just don't remember the name."

Shayne seemed to take a long pause, even if it was only seconds. First he looked at his watch, and then he glanced questionably at Noah.

"Do you want to watch it together sometime?"

It was really the type of question that took him aback, and Noah stuttered out the first thing that really came to his mind.

"You just said it was terrible."

Quickly, he was corrected.

"I said it was generic, when did I say it was terrible?"

Noah tried to think back to what had just been said, and he found himself failing to recall things.

"Well, you said Michael Bay did it, maybe that's why I just..."

"Oh, well, yeah, uh, from what I remember it was pretty damn bad, but, maybe I could get your number and we can figure out some time to get together. It's probably on Netflix. You should decide though, because I gotta go."

"A date? Are - is that what you're asking?"

His voice almost cracked. He noticed the way Shayne just kind of shrugged and sat up straight, preparing himself to leave apparently as he had just said. He was close to grabbing his pen but Noah grabbed it first.

"Uh, sure. I don't have any objections to that."

Noah gave a curious, questioning look with his darker eyes and he pulled Shayne's notebook closer to him too. Unable to read upside down he couldn't really tell what the other had been writing, but it was apparent he had ink stained hands and his notebook was well loved.

In very small script, Noah scribbled his phone number down at the top part closest to him before setting the pen back down.

Shayne gathered his things, and the taller kid grabbed his backpack and stood up. 

"I guess I'll go too, I still haven't seen anyone else in here. I'll grab something from Starbucks, I guess. It was, well, nice to see you, I guess."

He stumbled over the last few words, but did begin to leave. As he headed to the door, he heard a faint 'you too'.

Almost making it out of the store, Noah realized though his phone had been left on the table. He cursed quietly to himself, heading to the table to retrieve it. When he had it in his hand and flipped it over, he felt the buzz of a new message - an unknown number, explicitly asking 'what coffee did you want'. 

He just did an entire look around the store, even swirling around to check outside if anyone was there. When he made it full circle almost back to where he started, only to notice Shayne was now behind the counter with a cup in his hand and marker in the other. He had the top half of his apron pulled from around his neck to dangle down instead, and Noah curiously approached the counter. This would explain why he couldn't have seen the apron under the table.

Even the nametag he now had donned somehow pointed out his name was indeed spelled 'Shayne', with a 'y'. 

"Um - you work here?" 

His voice definitely cracked this time, and Shayne nodded a little.

"In fairness I was just on break, but, I mean, normally the service is a bit shitty."

Noah set his hand on the counter, taking in this as well. He hadn't even paid attention much to how long they had been talking or anything, so he just gave a low sigh.

"A regular coffee, with a good bit of cream and sugar."

No, now Noah was convinced everyone he had met was probably at least this crazy or crazier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uuuuh so- shayne, coffee shop worker yet actor, uh, I wasn't going to 'go there' but a lovely friend pointed out Shayne himself stated that's what he was gonna do before Smosh (mario kart 8 sga livestream w/flitz, shayne, & courtney) so I did it. I went there. sorry
> 
> The movie referred to in the chapter is 'The Unborn' and literally, I checked after I wrote 'it's probably on netflix', but yeah. Yeah it's on Netflix. 
> 
> as a disclaimer I'm not Jewish, just someone with interest in various religions but well, I wasn't really sure what the common stance is about animals having souls? after research on various Judaism group values, uh, the conclusion is there is very rarely an absolute conclusion, so I yanked some stuff from y'know eastern european Jewish values because 1) okay 2) it's late 3) his grandmother was born in yugoslavia 4) that was eastern europe 5) that's obviously where his jewish connection is from that we know of 6) uhhhh yeah okay. well. so. that all. is at least y'know. comprised of various tidbits of actual sources of Jewish religious leaders, scholars, etcetcetcyou'renotevenreadingstillareyou
> 
>  
> 
> okay thank you for reading this chapter absolutely was not setting up the next group session and for the point of view to change thannnks see you next time!!!


	3. Joven & Wes - Outside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here, we focus in on the two roommates - who are comfortable, uncomfortable, and also too comfortable with one another.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi
> 
> I planned to have this sooner but I actually had a good bit of research to do for future chapters that involved a bunch of medical stuff because I.. desire accuracy...
> 
> ...do you see any new tags? :) there are new tags. that - that will likely be a fairly normal occurrence, new tags as needed.
> 
> the actual next chapter should be a session. almost 10k words, folks. strap in for the ride

All that Wesley Johnson was doing was resting in bed, his arm under his pillow as he stared at the back of his eyelids. He was not asleep, no, but it probably would look like it to others. With both hands he clenched the sheets of his bed gently, his brain working overtime in the fantasy he had created. A fantasy in the purest sense of the word - there was not a single thought of anything sexual. In his intense, vivid daydreams, anything could happen though. 

Just none of it was usually even remotely about sex.

His bedroom being near the front door, he heard when the door opened and was subsequently shut very fast. This kind of upset Wes, seeing as he was trying to get some alone time at the moment. It was already interrupted though, the stream of imagination, and he bowed his head down against the bed. Throwing the pillow over his face instead and holding it there, he sighed softly. Just a few more moments, he thought. He heard his roommate throw some bag on the floor, before the quite obvious sound of keys being thrown on the kitchen counter.

All in all, there was no way he knew Joshua 'Joven' Ovenshire would come back from the weekend he was bound to have and come back in a pleasant mood. The times that he could go and see his family, he did try, but he always came back upset. Sometimes, the guy even came back early. 

Those times were terrible ones indeed, but this was not early, Wes figured. Probably not, anyway, though he didn't know the exact time really. He had just laid in bed on top of the sheets with the blanket thrown half on the floor for who knew how long. 

It was pretty regular for him, just like it was more than normal for Joven to be upset after visiting his family.

The guy at least had family hanging around on this side of the country, Wes bemoaned in his head before hearing the inevitable knock on his bedroom door. There was a voice sounding slightly cracked as it spoke, higher pitched than usual and strained in general.

"Wes! Wes, you're here, right? Can I come in?"

They were such good friends though - how could he say no?

When Joven just slowly opened the door to let light flood in the room, Wes blinked and slowly tried to get acclimated to the world around him. He pulled the pillow down from around his face and turned toward the door instead, instead of facing the wall like usual.

"Yeah, come on in, Joven."

He spoke timidly. This friend he had, Joven, also Joshua, but never Josh - he looked a bit more tired than usual. Joven's features were softer than his own, all of him sort of softer in general, but they both had their own ways of being handsome. Somehow when Joven was upset or tired though, and he looked both at the moment, Wes had to admit he looked more handsome than usual.

Just in the back of his mind though.

Soon enough Joven had made a beeline for Wes' bed, sitting on the edge of it near him. Wes brought his pillow down to his chest and hugged it, just staring at Joven while waiting for him to speak. 

They had known one another long enough to where Wes knew if he just didn't speak for long enough that Joshua would fill the silence.

It was almost like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, meaning there was Joven and then there was Joshua. Both entirely the same person, not that there was some hideous deformed split in personality, but Wes had come to think of things like this. Joshua would lose his cool demeanor and complain in earnest about life. Joven was the 'cool' demeanor he tried to keep hold of, the one he projected to people.

Wes knew that Joven had been bullied a lot in school, but, he managed to carry over that sort of personality that made people make fun of him even as an adult. 

After quite a bit of work on himself though he could take it, but Wes knew his friend always took what his family said about him especially to heart.

"It's been how fucking long and they just don't..." Joven fully stopped in silence, and Wes could see that he had clenched his fist rather tightly. Wes sat up in his bed, crossing his legs as he sat behind Joven. 

He just didn't want to look at him while he ranted and raved, because while anger in his eyes made him handsome the expression on his face was too sorrowful for him. Wes leaned against him and for the first time in a long time urged him on a bit to speak.

"Joven, it's okay, you know, you're a grown guy, you don't even have to go see them if you don't want to."

Wes was able to glance and see as Joven looked over a tattoo on his wrist. It was meant to symbolize the very first paranormal activity group he had been in, and he knew it meant so much to him.

"I don't get it. I don't get it, and there's nothing even I can say that I haven't said before. They're never going to get it unless I start working some boring fucking job at a desk and..." He trailed off again, and Wes could tell it wasn't because his job was working at a desk. After all he knew the other knew he wasn't insulted that easy. This is the way he always thought about Joven, in a complicated, convoluted way that repeated itself too often. 

He didn't want anything in return for it, though.

Joven actually pounded his fist against the mattress side, but softly, very softly. That was actually a great improvement.

"It's boring to me, Wes, it's goddamned boring, and I would rather decapitate myself."

"You have quite a few swords, maybe you should use them for something."

He offered up without any amount of help to the situation. At this point in time, no matter how much that he wanted to help he knew that there was really not much of anything that he could do at all in order to help. It sounded cliché and stupid, but it was just something Joven had to do and come to terms with himself. 

There was a prolonged, frustrated sigh though. The sort of sigh that started off normal enough, but ended in the back of the throat.

"You could help at least, like, take the claymore and just. Chop away."

Wes slowly cast the pillow to the side, shaking his head. Normally he was a rather voracious laugher, but he gave a small exhale of a laugh. If he thought about it too long he'd probably start actually imagining it.

"I'd really rather not! That's kind of vicious."

"I don't want to die either." 

Joven groaned, looking back over his shoulder to Wes. Wes could feel the heated gaze and he kind of shrunk away, though his arms reached out and his hands touched the back of Joven's neck. He rubbed at his neck, even though he felt his shorter friend squirming a bit uncomfortably at it.

"Why is it so dark in here?" He exclaimed, and Wes observed him tilt his head back down. "What were you doing?"

"Nothing!"

The call was one of exasperation and pleading, because Wes knew how the reply would be.

"Why nothing? Why that again? You had something you were supposed to be doing, right? There has to be something."

"Nope, nothing, so why can't I just do nothing?"

"You can, I guess. Is it healthy? Not really."

There was a tone of a know-it-all voice that upped the pitch of his voice as he spoke, and Wes just plastered a tired smile on his own face. The other needed to micromanage around a bit to feel better about himself.

In a way, because of this, Wes felt guilty. Early on he would encourage Joven to keep things up with his family, to keep an open channel of communication, all because he missed his own family back all the way in Ohio quite deeply. 

Definitely because of his earlier encouragement Joven still tried, even though it was like he was still losing the battle after all these years.

"I'm fine, don't even worry about me. Really! I'm okay, and do not worry."

Wes began fidgeting because he could just about already imagine the look on the man's face.

"You worry me though. You need to go and get out, just do something. Everything we do is usually together and you - not even just you, but we, as in both of us, need more friends."

His hands had stopped rolling the muscles and working the tense tissue, and instead he fidgeting with the back of Joven's collar. He was finding it a bit hard to focus on real life, given that he had neglected to get his attention deficit medication refilled yet.

"I have friends."

"We have the same friends."

"Well--"

"A girlfriend or something, Wes, don't you want companionship?"

Joven's voice really had the characteristic of jumping around in pitch a lot. He was very expressive with his voice, with his hands, with his body language all inclusive. The most he was doing now was just the voice and still trying half heartedly trying to shake off Wes.

Usually when he was this still, he was rather sorrowful. The only times Wes had seen him go still and silent, absolutely about to explode under the surface though, would be in the presence of people berating him.

"The last time I tried dating, you know it didn't go too well."

Wes himself groaned, though he shook his head back and forth. He could handle this. He could keep his usual happy self, because he liked to be happy and he liked to counterbalance so everything stayed even.

"You tried dating like, three girls maybe, and it took you months, and you didn't do anything."

Wes sat back in the bed instead, until his back was against the wall. He nudged Joven in the back with a sock covered foot. 

"Joven, you know how I feel about that, and besides that? I get it, we need to meet people, but you're projecting a bit I think."

There was a shake of the head, and the brunette figured a scowl maybe. Not a scowl in malice - but the type that was from some knee jerk reaction to the accusation. He realized instead there was a pause, though it likely did not have much significance.

"This is the same routine, isn't it?"

"Hah, yeah. It is, you know. That is exactly what it is. Every single time you come back… You find me alone just, with my mind wandered off, you pull me back and vent by saying stuff like we need other people. We're not dating, like, geez, Joven, but just be a bit happier we have each other at least. Out of everyone else in this city."

Normally he wouldn't be so upfront, but he figured that Joven had made some sort of breakthrough by recognizing the pattern of stagnant and fruitless complaints. So despite everything, he laid back down in bed and gave a sigh. It actually sounded quite content, too, and he placed his hands clasped on his own stomach. 

Joven instead reached over and hit Wes' arm lightly, pulling and tugging at him.

"You're going to get out of bed and help me cook dinner, okay? Stop the daydreaming. Your mind will wander itself out of the window next."

Wes sat up, though it was much more of his own design than Joven's. He couldn't help it though, he just way too often left himself get lost daydreaming if allowed to. 

It was getting a bit better though, just as his loneliness kept ebbing as well.

"What do you want for dinner?"

Joven stood up, before heading over and turning the light on in the room. Wes shook his head rapidly, his eyes adjusting after being in the relative darkness for so long. 

"Breakfast. Breakfast for dinner."

"What? Again, really?"

"Kinda part of the routine now, isn't it?"

He was grinning over to Joven. He had seen so much growth in the other, but there were ways the both of them even needed help and they still would have to work on it.

There was no way that he regretted coming over here from out east. From their start together as two strangers on some internet forum about gaming that Wes moderated and soon found he had to usually rope Joven's angry personality off from others, all the way to who they were now. 

A lot had happened between then and now, too. Years of friendship later Wes had landed at the local airport with three suitcases, Joven had suggested they just live together when Wes had problems finding a place cheaper than dorm rooms, and Joven had helped him with his job…

Wes was still the one though that had encouraged Joven to see a psychotherapist, though he was the one who tried to keep Joven's hopes about his family up too because in reality he projected sometimes just as much as his dark haired friend did. To help with the guilt even from seeing Joven shell shocked nearly the first time, he had joined a group he heard about through a pamphlet that Joven had gotten and thrown away.

He wasn't even tired, but he rubbed at his eyes. 

Joven had already started off for the kitchen, yelling a few things here and there but only so his voice would be loud enough for Wes to hear. Wes slowly began to roll off the bed and yawn, letting Joven make the decisions for the both of them like what usually happened. 

Don't worry about the small details, he told himself. The other man knew him well enough anyway to know the things he'd object to.

Wes grabbed his phone near the bed though, switching it on just to be confronted with the fact he had been reading a page about codependent relationships before he had taken his escape and refuge to imagine and elaborate on the fantastical story in his mind about a world where things were their absolute best and perfect.

He switched it off when he saw no new messages though, sliding it in his pocket. If anything, he shouldn't be worried about the nature of their relationship after so many years. When he joined beside his friend again his fleeting thought was that he should be worried instead of any silence, small or large.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my friend tried to PEER PRESSURE me in to taking this story a wes/joven direction but they are just very close in this fic. 
> 
> nothing against the ship but! like - like, i'm trying to calm it down. even trying to take it a direction where they're good friends, great friends, but that - may not be the greatest. 
> 
> i'm so tired idfghdslfgdshfdsblf
> 
> so uh, uuh, background again. 
> 
> the background behind the background because i don't think the phrase was outright used? all the daydreaming stuff. 'maladaptive daydreaming'. characterized by excessive daydreaming, though difference from psychosis-related disorders in that people still 100% always know what's real or not. uhm yeah, maladaptive daydreaming is like it says. daydreaming is normal - daydreaming for hours on end or intermittently with the same recurring themes to where it affects your quality of life (ie, 'maladaptive') is not normal.
> 
> (also? asexual agenda promoter here h-hahah. thanks for reading and - yeah)


	4. Joven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of what's going on in Joshua's head. A lot of what's going on in his head, actually, just on a candid basis.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> first off. Hi
> 
> second off. Yes, there is a lot of flippant back and forth of referring to Joven as either 'Joshua' or 'Joven' on Wes' point of view from each side. These are intential and not an attempt to break continuity. Dissociative Identity ('multiple personalities') is not a part of this work, but to Wes, I hope it was made clear last chapter that he sees 'Joven' as an act and 'Joshua' as actually the real person. That does not mean it has something to do with him, just the perception of him as seen by Wes. Such... as Noah's perceptions of Shayne, seen previously. but please keep in mind every time there is a change, there is a subtle shift in wes' perception. I hope that comes across in the writing itself, I just, want to make that clear. 
> 
> See? See what I'm doing? There's even foreshadowing in this chapter to the next chapter more than you may think.

“We're going to be late!”

There was a hint of urgency, but the black haired part of the duo was actually the one more hyped and nervous.

“I know, I know, and I don't want to miss out on anything but where the hell are your keys?”

“I don't actually know.”

Wes responded quietly. They had planned to take his car, but now there was just this little obstacle. He couldn't just say that they should not go either, because the other probably needed to. 

The problem was they had finished dinner a bit later than expected, and that the other day when he came in from being outside Wes had just thrown his car keys around without paying much attention. That's what he thought happened. Little did he know, the keys were still in the pocket of the jeans he had worn that day, just now discarded in the laundry hamper.

“This is going great. My car's running out of gas.”

“We'll... siphon some out of mine later. Whatever? Let's just go.”

Joshua's hands were still in a flurry over every surface, moving around everything that he could and setting it back down haphazardly. It was making a bit of a mess of things, but nothing was that tidy to begin with. It's not that their place was a complete mess, but it was true that it at least looked lived in by two single guys in their mid-twenties with no reason to have anything organized.

“Are you going to drive then?”

“The reason you're bad at driving isn't because of your car, you're just blind.”

Wes retorted, because it did seem like he was pretty universally bad in any car he tried to drive. The idea that one car or another made him any better didn't really give him an upper hand in anything. He still wasn't a good driver. In no way was the retort meant to sound mean, though, but it may have had the slight edge to it that Wes didn't mean for it to because Joshua just slammed something down.

“Yeah, I'm pretty blind.”

The quiet words were not what was expected but Wes just nodded. He stopped the futile search and stayed against the door, so he could seem like he was paying attention when he really wasn't any longer.

It was hard to tune things out. It was especially difficult to tune out a loud person like his roommate. That had it's good sides and it's bad sides. On one hand he really should not be tuning such things out really, but on the other hand it was quite the form of escapism.

Every time he could get his mind away from the current time though, he could just feel it slip elsewhere. Time was ticking along, the universe was moving on, and Wes stayed frozen in place.

If he could ‘tune out’ for long enough, quite large amounts of time could pass by. It was hard with any sort of noise or actions nearby, true. With his eyes closed and just the noise of ruffling and under-the-breath curses Wes could stay quiet. The air in the room felt heavy enough without the other speaking.

It was the concentrated frustration that got Wes to just talk again.

“You’re blind enough to drive, now can we leave?”

The black haired man came near by, grabbing a pair of keys off the key ring next to Wes. He didn’t look happy about this turn of events, but he was rather just letting it go on organically.

“Siphon gas, that’s the stupidest thing I’ve heard.”

It was said with a sort of laugh though, a grumbling under the breath quality with a pout and smile on his lips. Upon looking at him, one just had to laugh. It was the same face he’d give when he said he hated hugs, which coincidentally it was the face that usually led to him getting hugs.

This time before Wes could even try though, the other was out the door and leading him to an uneventful car ride.

\- - - - - 

They were indeed a bit late upon arrival. Joshua was the one to be in more of a hurry though to get to the actual room, while Wes actually came to a full pause before they were down the right hall. It earned him a stare, and the brunette stood his ground.

“I think I’m going to go get a drink, actually.”

“You didn’t want to be late, though.”

Joshua’s voice croaked a bit, and there was no explanation that would be satisfactory to be given.

“I know, but…”

“And they have drinks.”

“Yeah, like coffee and water, and I want to get something real to drink.”

“Do you think they actually changed the coffee up for Matt though? No, that’s not -- fine, it’s fine, we don’t have to be attached. I’m not your wife. You can get there without getting lost, right?”

Wes allowed himself a half smile. Raising his eyebrows was just cocky, and he reveled in it. Too often was he entirely taken for some sort of child that had no idea what they were doing. He was actually an adult contrary to that belief.

“I’ll get there, go on yourself.”

“Is this to get some candy from the vending machines?”

He hyped up a little at the mention, grinning. 

“That’s obvious, I love candy. It’s not the only reason though!”

“Okay, Wes. Okay.”

With that, a very doubtful Joven was on his path to the meeting room.

Sometimes Wes just had to separate himself from the groups, though. From anyone in life really. A part of him felt bad he was jealous that Joshua could still go visit his own family but was always at odds with them. That was not how things worked, the world wasn’t black and white and Wes knew it. The world was actually painted so many different shades of gray it was dizzying to think there were that many.

For someone who wanted to really go in the first place, he found himself playing hookie for the first time. He had no plans to miss the entire meeting, but he found his way with his shoes pattering against the linoleum to head toward the cafeteria where they had vending machines that were always at work.

Some sort of 1% real juice product and some small bag of cookies that promised to be soft yet would be hard he knew. These were his two purchases, and he found himself leaning against a vending machine. 

His brain wanted to switch off when things got too much. It was stressful having Joven right back at home, when he was both angered and trying to pretend that he was not angered. There was also more in life to stress about than his friend, but his roommate was a convenient scapegoat.

He managed to eat the package of small cookies one at a time, his bottle of juice tucked into a pocket. As always his pants had way too many zippers, but at least they did have deep pockets. One of the fantasies that he had included having a partner and living together in a small cottage, a partner that could help rescue him from the bullshit of day to day life. There was no shred of reality in this daydream, and the idea of his partner was a gray shapeless figure neither female nor male. 

It was just somebody that he could feel loved with.

It’d be too cliché to say they lived in a fake city, but Wes suspected any dates he had failed not on the other person’s fault but on his own disinterest. If they wanted to be a friend, though, he loved friends! He would love to have the chance to connect more with some of the people he already knew, in fact. In this fantasy he could imagine them being a part of it, close friends that they’d come over and all eat lunch together. 

The fantasies and daydreams were not fantastical or groundbreaking, but just a way to de-stress and feel peace.

Of course it came at the price tag that by the time he looked at his watch however, he was running even more late. The cookie bag got crumpled up and thrown away before he purchased another with the remaining coins in his pocket. 

The trek back to the group meeting room took a few minutes. The hospital as a whole was large, a winding and twisting maze all alive on it’s own. He could recall having to bring Joshua here before, or having to see Joshua already here, or the once Joshua was messaging him from across the country when they still hadn’t met from a room in this same hospital. Accident prone, sometimes sickly Joshua. The hospital had a beating heart of it’s own, surrounded by the many cries of the sick and weary.

The air walking through the hospital was heavy. Maybe that’s why it took Wes a while to walk, and why when he saw the door in sight he opened up the second small bag of cookies to nibble on one.

When he came closer though, he could hear his friend speaking rather distraught. It sounded like he had just exhaled and let everything out.

“I just don't know how I feel! That kind of stuff isn't really my area of expertise, you know.”

Wes had stopped to listen. There was a part of him saying to just stay back, to listen to what was going on. It wasn't his usual type of behavior, either. The way that Joven had put emphasis on the word 'expertise' made Wes want to take on the role of a fly on the wall out of sight.

He actually leaned against the wall, figuring he could still walk in at any moment. There was no way of knowing if this would get too heated or not, or possibly too awkward to walk in later.

“What, your feelings aren't an area of expertise?”

The exclamation had come from Mari, and things seemed to immediately sink into a heated discussion from there.

“No! Every time I think that I'm so sure about something, always something huge and life changing, it blows up in my face.”

“Then just do the opposite of what you were going to do. That way you'll have a chance to be right.”

Just with that statement from Lasercorn alone, there likely was going to be a large fight to break out. When there was the group of a few select people talking, they took over everything. It was likely because of the bubbling volcano waiting to blow, that Joe seemed to speak up though, a voice of exasperated reasoning.

“What about one big thing in your life, Joshua? Can you share an example?”

There was no telling what had even led to this conversation. Even from outside of the room though, you could hear Joshua just take in a deep sharp breath and exhale loudly.

“I don't always think I'm a great person. Like, okay, no! I'm a great person. I'm a good person, and whatever I try I usually have good intentions, but what does that even mean? A lot of my life has been luck. Oh but I’m a good person so that means good things should happen to me, right? That’s not what it means and I can accept that. It’s just that because it worked out for me, doesn't mean it worked out for everyone else.”

He was verbally tripping over words, not even trying to gather his thoughts before speaking. Wes managed to peek in the room, just barely looking in before he moved back away. He couldn't see Joven, but he saw quite a few around him. It was a full house tonight.

“You're talking about Wes.” Matt said point blank as Wes looked back away before he was noticed. He gripped the hem of his own shirt with one hand, wondering if that was really the case. “It's clear that you like him or some shit, just get it over with.” 

There was immediate backlash.

“No – no, I don't.”

“What, did he reject you already?”

Hearing all this made the brunette feel even stranger, but it continued on.

“He didn't because there's nothing to reject! He's a good friend, I like him as a good friend. He's been there for me in my life a long time, when things were shitty or when things weren't. It's not just that he's lonely and stuff, but I just really don't know if things were the best for him. Because he's a friend, and yeah, he's only a friend, I still care 'cause I feel like I had this big influence. I mean really, I was the only influence in him picking everything up and leaving. I don't know what kind of better life I was trying to sell if he moved out here, but he could have easily just made a best friend where he was.”

“Whatever was done was ultimately his choice.”

Amra was usually a voice of reason, and this time was no exception. It had been the case where know he would have felt too awkward about entering the room, but he would have said something similar.

“Peer pressure. I guess. Whatever it was. Whatever it was, it wasn't probably right for him. How would he have known if it was? There's really no way to tell. And part of me hates the idea if he just got up and moved away, it's selfish but I don't care how it'd be better for him. I just care it'd make me lonely. And that makes me a bad friend.”

That was arguable, Wes thought. Was it really up to anyone else know what was best for him? The words about it being selfish may have been somewhat true though, but getting up and moving away wasn't even on his mind.

“So why did you even ask him to come out here.”

Lasercorn's voice piped up, except it really didn't sound like a question at all. That was the strange part. There was the option though maybe that he understood something about moving away though, because although he never told a consistent story to others he had spoken to Wes before about being from Ohio. Those in California were not known for heavy accents, and he could have been from any area where this was the case, but some of the stories he told about being a reckless teen obviously was as if he had been a reckless teen in the midwest.

There was nothing to gain from such a lie, either. It was after Wes had brought up that was where he was from.

Wes usually believed him a bit more than others. Sometimes if the lie was blatant even, he felt the guy just needed someone to listen and maybe he’d stop crying wolf for attention.

“I liked him, I liked him way back, like there was nobody around me really! I met him and never told him but I started to like him even more after meeting him. And yeah, I fucking mean I liked him like that, but I kinda realized he didn't seem to pick that up and I moved on a long time ago. So saying my intentions are anything but selfish is wrong.”

“Nobody said you didn't have selfish intentions, just maybe not vilify yourself for them.”

Joe had brought up that piece of wisdom as the brunette now kind of slumped against the wall outside. His brow furrowed and he felt a bit frustrated. When he first came out this way had he really even noticed Joven's affections? Kind of, but there never had been much charm laid down or anything and it had seemed to pass. 

How would he ever get back in the room now though after that drop of truth?

“A crappy childhood I didn't even realize was that crappy, just being the weird kid a lot, trying to be good at speaking, trying to do the job I have well, trying to latch on to my best friend. I want to look out for what's best for both of us, still. I appreciate him being around. It's like, one thing I really have going for me.”

He could understand that. He really could. Putting the effort out there but feeling lonely in the end and giving it up, well, it was something he had already gave up. There was obviously things that were stirred up in Joshua though that Wes could not have even imagined. 

So while slumped against the wall just outside the door, he kind of just slid down it. It felt like the stereotypical action someone would make in a movie, but the stress was starting to hit him and he didn’t want to feel anyway. Maybe he could just be a figure in a film.

He would formally stake out his position here, and when everyone took their exit he'd make an excuse up. Looking at his phone to tell what the time was, he decided there wouldn't be that much more time apparently and he'd wait.

“You can’t blame yourself, not for anything and everything. Some things are probably your fault, but you know what? There’s time to just be a good person. Be real to yourself. Maybe what drew you to Wes was being two old souls, that you all knew each other before in another life and had to meet again.”

With the words Amra spoke, the brunette wondered if anyone was upset that this now was taking up everything. He knew that wasn’t how things worked, but it felt guilt wracking to be the topic.

“We went through kind of a lot together though!” His voice wavered as it raised slightly. “I think I’ll always just have these feelings though that things got fucked up.”

“That’s where healthy methods of coping come through. Train yourself to think otherwise. Don’t -- don’t paint yourself as the villain if you’re the only one who thinks you’re one.”

After Joe’s spiel there were a few noises around the room.

“Anger management helped you out, right? Take and train those methods to work for you in more areas.”

Wes took a deep drink of the juice, starting to stand back up as he did. He just knew if he entered that the air would be so thick even a heated knife couldn’t cut it, so he rearranged what he was holding so he could look at his phone again and try to browse around a bit.

There was a hushed whisper about something though which led off into other whispers. 

“He’s actually asleep. Holy crap.”

The conversation made a complete change in direction, with this expression being just a bit louder than others -- enough that Wes could hear from outside. So Matt was asleep, then, he assumed it meant. Looking at the time actually, he began to head outside really. 

He knew there may be a bit of fallout for him and his buddy to speak about, but it wouldn’t be too bad if there was something to talk about like the fact that Matt fell asleep when the guy never, ever slept.

So instead he ended up waiting outside, for all of the five minutes before people began filing out of the place. It must have been cut just a bit short, with the new development.

When Amra came out, a wooden carved ankh on display against his chest, he clamped a hand on Wes’ shoulder from behind. 

“He said you were here, what happened?”

“I was, I got a call from my sister. We were talking. I hope things went okay today!”

He gave a warm smile. Amra was probably the least threatening person in that room, and given he was a clinical psychologist himself he was quite intelligent on all such matters. Even, well, if he did believe in the spiritual type stuff that was a bit ‘alternative’. 

It also meant though that Amra was always keeping an eye on things closely.

“Alright, alright. Just see you next time though, right?”

“Yeah.”

He noticed of the people coming out, Matt was holding on to Courtney’s arm. He didn’t look happy, but Courtney looked concerned. Shayne and the new kid before he could hear from the hall though, sounding like there was some type of argument with Joe mainly coming from the former -- but when he heard a movie title, he just tuned it out. 

Joshua came out pretty quickly, looking a lot more composed than Wes would have thought.

“My sister called.” “You missed--”

They spoke in tandem, to try and make things less awkward for the other. Joshua kind of laughed it off, starting again. “You missed it all.”

“That’s okay! There will be other times!”

He had to sound optimistic, like he hadn’t heard anything that occurred in the room. Joshua gestured to the bag of cookies he held, and Wes didn’t even try to be sheepish about it.

“Yes, I got distracted, too. Plain and simple. But I don’t regret it. I don’t really regret anything.”

Joshua turned his head up and quizzically looked at Wes before giving a half cocked smirk, finding the statement odd yet not considering it had much meaning behind it.

“You should regret it a little, maybe. It was interesting. Well, the end of it anyway. You ready to go home?”

“Ready to go back to our place? Yeah. Sounds great.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a hard time working on this honestly because I was so busy in life. Some bad stuff happened, some good stuff happened. I love writing though, it's very soothing. I unfortunately did end up writing most of this chapter and then losing it though, which brought about such frustration. anyone who has worked on writing and lost a significant portion of it KNOWS it sucks to rewrite it and doesn't feel the same.
> 
> I don't want to make people entirely out of character as well, but these ARE fictionalized accounts, 100%. I got kinda worried a lot about that, and how it's not 'proper writing' to switch the views this way. But... I like what I'm doing in this fic. I have even far off ideas for it, I have even the ending! It'll just be a while to get all the way there.


	5. Matt & Courtney - Outside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> some soft support and a lot of lack of sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> courthinki chapter
> 
> a lotta backstory and some mystery
> 
> i have nothing else to say  
> seeya next time space cowboy

“I can drive us home.”

He insists with a tone that isn’t threatening at all, but it makes Courtney Miller nervous. Or, perhaps, not so much nervous as she is worried for him. It may even elicit a bit of a sad response as well, she can’t really tell what she’s feeling when he offers this.

“Aw, come on, I can drive us!”

She tries to be happy and upbeat, because she just is happy and upbeat a lot of the time. The just watched Matt fall asleep at the tail end of the meeting though, kind of ending it. That was something that definitely wouldn’t make him happy, but she thought that when they did get home she could help him calm down.

“It’s no big deal, I can still drive. You trust me, right?”

The question was just a little unfair, but Courtney kind of smiled and shrugged it off. Gripping his shoulder lightly, she urged him to keep on walking. Maybe the longer he did and the more that he felt his body was giving out on him, he’d be less inclined to drive while tired.

He was always tired was the thing. Dark circles swept under his eyes, and his face was full of just enough five o’clock shadow that it usually over grew and left him with just enough wisps of facial hair. Not a full beard, not a growing one, but just enough to put him into the sort of chic category of ‘gamer who looked a bit sickly, yet attractive’. 

Not the tallest, not the most stable (she had initially dragged him to these meetings, to then support him), not the healthiest with his constant state of half consciousness. The lack of sleep was terrifying a bit even, and he gripped a paper cup of coffee in his hand that he didn’t know was decaf. 

The thing about Matt though was that he could dance, he was smart, he could make her laugh. Her own humor wasn’t usually dry, but that just made the things he said at times a bit shockingly funny.

They walked to his car together. Courtney steered herself to the driver’s seat almost immediately though and the decision was not met with resistance by Matt. Taking off to the side, he swirled the coffee around in his cup. 

“It tastes a bit different. We still have some of that - that one kind, right?”

Like she felt a good girlfriend should, she knew what he meant by the few words alone.

“I think we do, yeah. You buy it like every other day, we gotta have some!”

She slipped and began to speak in some type of stereotypical accent at the second sentence. Something that was New York, New Jersey, something indescript from a place she hadn’t been but had watched people copy the stereotypical voice in movies. That was a silly little thing she liked to do, and it seemed to elicit a smile from most.

Matt didn’t pass up the chance to smile, but it also just dissipated rather quickly.

“I just want to be home with you more than anything.”

For all the grumpiness that could come from him being so tired, there was sometimes a lot of sweetness that seeped out too.

/ / / / /

The bed was not that large, but it would have easily fit both of them. At least it would, if Courtney ever woke up with Matt beside her. By the light flooding in the curtains she could sense it was still pretty early, but getting on a bit late in the morning. It meant early for her, though. Her blonde hair was tousled from tossing around and turning in bed a bit, and she brushed it around with her fingers before getting up. 

It was easy to stumble and find her way to the bathroom, rubbing her eyes, brushing her teeth, washing her face. To bed she just had on one of her boyfriend’s gaming shirts which was just the slightest bit tight on her considering her curves and left a little tummy showing above her boyshorts. 

She had gotten just enough sleep yet still felt a bit tired. How difficult she felt life must be for the guy she was so enamored with, seeing how often he unblinkingly stared insomnia in the face.

What a problem for a normal person to have, she thought of herself. Feeling tired after six hours sleep, plus the fact she could actually go to sleep at night. Comparing problems of two different people never bode well and she knew this. It was something that gave herself difficulties even moreso, after all.

Before she could get too concerned with this, there was the smell of what seemed like fresh brewed coffee wafting in the apartment. That was far too typical. She already had taken care of her teeth, sure, but it was just a morning pick me up and she could repeat some hygiene before showering. Since she was a bit more one for liking coffee that was sweet with laden with dairy, she was happy to remember she kept around caramel coffee creamer in their fridge that could have been a bit fuller.

Exiting the bathroom, she tiptoed around on her feet to meet up with where Matt was. Her presence wasn’t a shock to him, so she just embraced him when she saw him. He wrapped one arm back around her and it was a bit tight, truth be told.

“Not a wink of sleep, huh?”

His mumbling was a little hard to hear, but she knew it amounted to a ‘yes’ answer. They let go of one another as she grabbed a mug from where the clean dishes were set to dry and she poured her own coffee from the nearby carafe, as well as pouring some in the cup nearby that she easily identified as his. She added her coffee creamer, feeling Matt’s hands on her back as she had leaned over just a bit to grab it.

It was a comforting touch, soft and gentle.

“How did you sleep, princess?”

The pet name of ‘princess’ was spoken a bit dryly, yet she still ended up smiling and facing him. 

“Maybe I could have slept a bit better with you.”

All the time she dropped this little hints. He had to know exactly why they were being said though, and they never much phased him sadly. His exterior may not have been that well put together, but on the inside he was held together tightly with threads of guilt squeezing his brain and preventing him from sleeping. 

‘Be a perfectionist, be better than perfect. Your brother is a doctor, you have to find a way to do better than what you are. Treat Court better, if you don’t provide more, she’ll have no reason to stay. You’re an idiot for thinking you can keep this under wraps and keep her around, she’ll get tired of you. You have to be better at what you do and better at things you only casually touch, even.’

It was similar to thoughts that plagued the blonde at times.

“I know. I bet. We’ll sleep together soon, okay? In bed? Sleep together?”

He was tickling her sides a bit and she laughed, pushing him away just gently and a bit playfully. It did bring a smile to her face, a hand around her warm coffee mug. 

“Okay, innuendo. I see what you did with that. Only if you sleep first!”

One of the most frustrating parts of being an adult was being told off about your sleep habits, but it really just slid off Matt with how much he heard it from anyone who knew him.

“I’m a guy, you know, they go hand in hand, sleep… And then sleep. Isn’t that a good idea?”

She gave him a teasing look, with her lips pursed and a solitary eyebrow raised. It was the sense of playfulness in her eyes though that let him know that she was okay.

“If I get mine, I guess I can’t argue with that. So what did you do all night?”

They separated from touching one another, but Matthew held his mug with both hands and shook his head lightly.

“A lot of researching, I think I’m onto something there. I was looking up marketing strategies, too. I think I’m doing okay, but how can I do it better?”

Courtney made her way to the living room, noting the small blanket on the couch with the laptop nearby. It looked like some type of spreadsheet, as well as many other windows taking up the space. The chances were good that it was a flurry of activity that Sohinki wasn’t really finishing up by any means. He likely felt the more he did it, the closer he felt to something big, but he never quite reached it because he never quite slept.

“I think you’re doing fine, Matt.”

He followed after her, taking to the seat he had given up on the couch to just curl up on it again. He crossed his legs and set the coffee down, though not far out of reach.

“Do you want to go out today, maybe?”

She was asking and trying to question him, but he grabbed the back of his own neck and just gave a small grimace.

“I dunno. I finished up some work, but there’s always more to be done.”

“Well, what was the last thing you finished?”

Going quiet for only a moment, feeling as if his brain wasn’t attached to his memories… he had to pause before answering back up.

“Ah, a book on the paleo diet. Finished that up and compiled it all and read over it, fifteen thousand words. I still have something coming up about juice cleanses or some garbage, but then there’s a thing also about the evolution of Nintendo as a company.”

He edited texts sometimes, but most of what he did was ghostwriting. He’d be given a topic, with some opinion he was supposed to hold about writing it, and a minimum and maximum word limit… he’d send it off, get paid while the person or people pumping out all the books was paid more. It did pay better than writing school papers though, and was less pressure, honestly. He didn’t have to actually know the subject, he could just pretend for those books that would be sold digitally for 4 or 5 bucks.

He juggled these paying jobs with the occasional pay he would get from what he actually aspired to do, which was gaming. Streaming. Finding a way to increase his web presence or whatever, because he had to market himself for sale as some sort of personality. He could work as much as he wanted though, and he felt the cons of that more than the benefits.

“You’ve done a lot, then.”

“I know.”

His words were defensive, yet quiet. Courtney sat close beside him, and placed her coffee down as she reached and grabbed his shoulders gently.

“You were also working on what else?”

“Upcoming topics, improving rankings, some textbook I found on the psychology of marketing.”

It was kind of natural that they just slowly moved into a new position. She tugged at his body lightly, and he laid down across her lap. He glanced at the things he could have been doing, but closed his eyes and gave a soft sigh.

“I have some schoolwork to do. I can just read here.”

She meant right where she was. The book was nearby on the couch, she could just reach and grab it. In the meantime, she held the side of Matt’s face, cupping it gently while her other hand played with his hair.

“You could…”

She was the only person left for him that he felt comfortable with like this. He had acquaintances, he had friends, he had people he knew. 

It was just that Courtney was very likely the love of Matt’s life. It had taken time to get this way, but he would probably eventually tell her. He had to, after all.

She was always so graceful under pressure. He had helped her in immense ways, even though he didn’t feel he had. It was enough being in her own place, with someone supportive and actually able to pay attention. With her sister she had a close bond, but the rest of her many siblings? Not in the least. Her house had always been full of people in and out, but now she was out and let alone to be her own person.

It didn’t matter that things weren’t perfect, as long as she kept up the things she had to do. She still was looking for more work besides part time at a pharmacy, and then they’d be better off. She wanted them to work as a unit together.

When she looked down, understandably, Matt had fallen asleep. It certainly wasn’t the first time things had gone that way. He’d rest around her and be asleep.

His ex-girlfriend was a very nice person, she was beautiful and wonderful, but she had wanted a life full of more adventure than the risks that Matt was willing to take. If things worked well, Matt didn’t want to break them by taking a risk and failing.

Often times, he dreamed of the only one time he was bit for doing such a thing. He’d dream soon enough as he often did of being in a car, maybe even the fight that came before it, too. The dream would change to a hellish scape of twisted metals and blood, but he still rarely woke from it.

Courtney would have no idea though as she just rested a hand on his hair, letting him sleep as she held a book about animal physiology in one hand.


	6. David & Amra - Outside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's not a group therapy session - it's an invitation to watch one of Amra's counseling sessions with 'Lasercorn'.

“So, how is everything going?”

The question was posed rather simply, as Amra didn't yet even have any writing utensil out to document the appointment if need be. ‘If need be’ - and there usually was a need, at least when it came to the more fantastical stories.

“Oh, just great, really. Everything’s fine. My wife is pregnant. I think I did a good job there, you know? Not a one man job there. It, well, it’s a one man and a one woman job. Most of the time.”

The counselor leaned back in his chair, tapping his fingers on the armrest. He didn’t know how to take the news, and he knew that if he just listened then it would encourage the other man to keep talking.

“Really think I’m going to make a good dad. And it’s about time, you know? We’ve been married a while. We weren’t really holding off on anything. I have an awesome job and she, well, she has an awesome job that… will need scaled back a bit, in due time. Then for a bit after the kid’s born, but I can take off some time too. It’ll work out.”

“It must be pretty early on in the pregnancy. You haven’t even alluded to this before, and you see me… twice a week.”

He really rarely ever missed an appointment. There wasn’t much about David’s personal life that he could really confirm or deny, but he had strong feelings that at some point the pathological lying had alienated him. That was way before he suggested a support group, knowing that he could weave whatever tales of fancy there.

“She’s actually like… actually, we don’t know. She peed on some sticks yesterday. Was getting sick in the mornings, you know? Guess it’s kind of stereotypical stuff, but probably everything about pregnancy is stereotypical when you consider babies are always getting made and born. Only so much you can say.”

The orange haired man was really quickly tiring of the subject. He sunk into the couch, crossing his arms over his chest to cover himself up better. There was no point in bringing up that he felt a bit cold. He lifted his feet up on the couch too, showing off his worn off sneakers.

“What about you? How’s your quest to have a baby with a person of every color? Or are you still seeing--”

Amra pursed his lips and shook his head, raising a finger up. This was enough to get him to hold his tongue for a brief moment.

“This is your time, and you know that. You’re not paying me to be your friend.”

“We’re kind of friends.” He challenged that statement, only to then rescind it a bit. “No, I’m not even paying you at all. I pay my health insurance that I somehow still have, and they pay you. Besides, I’m a great guy. People are lucky to be friends with me. They should pay me, in fact, to be friends.”

“Have you met recently with any friends?”

He didn’t shrink away from the question, answering it immediately.

“Oh, yeah. We completely cleared everything out of this cave, killed a bunch of other people, then killed everything in this dungeon. We’re planning on meeting again next week, but you know, it was me carrying them on my shoulders. My strong, masculine orc shoulders. Really was a great time, but they’d get nowhere without me. Starting to get a group of friends on these other games too, you know, just by showing up enough.”

“Okay, but anything not on the computer?”

“I mean…”

David paused, and soon enough he was lying on the couch instead. It was just a love seat, and he wasn’t that tall but he still had to slump a bit to fit, and with his huddled over position he ignored the paintings of space and the universe and Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics on the walls to look directly at his counselor.

“One of these games, I think that guy Matt was in it. It was a horror game, you outrun this killer to try and escape, and there are four of you and you can be the killer or the people trying to outsmart the killer. Anyway, after a round, we all joined up again, and his username was something weird, it was like, Mike? Maybe it was Mark. Whatever it was, it was not Matt…”

Amra had to stop him there, holding a hand up as he curiously looked over David’s facial expression. There was nothing about him that didn’t read sincere, but that was so often the case when he actually believed most of what he said anyway. 

“What guy, Matt? Am I supposed to know who this Matt is?”

“Um, yeah. From the meetings. The meetings that you make me go to. He was talking in this game, and he was really good! Really smart, it was fun to hang out. I didn’t talk just in case he noticed and was going to stop…Like if he wanted to leave just because he recognized my voice or something.”

“You think if he knew it was you, he would have left?”

He kind of grimaced at that. Maybe he shouldn’t have worded it that way, he realized, but he didn’t know how else he should have done it. The question had stalled his rapid responses, because now he actually had to think.

“Maybe.” That was the best he could come up with. He gave an odd smile, one that was pressed and concerned, a smile that he had to force. “I think he maybe would have left, not because he knows me, but because he doesn’t. Does that even make any sense?”

To Amra, it made perfect sense. In fact, so many things that this man did made sense to him. As much as he had put forward into learning about him, he could now build up quite a psych profile about him. It went all the way back to a complicated medical history, one nearly thirty years old now.

It was a bit sad to think about, but it was just another facet of the universe. One of those things that made the galaxy eternally sprawling and so chaotic and good.

He knew he didn’t have to console him with the fact that he was able to speak openly. If he wanted to speak, he always found a way.

“It sounds like it was a pretty casual environment. How could you not let him get to know you there then? How else could he get to know you?”

“See, I never really had a lot of people I was close to with or anything. People don’t listen to me because they don’t even take a moment and consider what I say.”

“It sounds like it would be easier to just not be yourself, then.”

He looked intensely curious at what Amra meant, because surely the man wasn’t advocating he actually take that to heart. In fact, that was the opposite that he usually did. He would be indulged only to a degree, but he still felt only vaguely accepted.

Out of everyone, he thought that this man would be the one who realized he was who he was, any faults or all, and it was all a part of his own truth.

“Well… I don’t think I can just jump in someone else's skin.”

When he said that, he felt as if maybe it had been a ruse to get him to say exactly that. Carefully orchestrated words meant to pick at his seams, that was what his therapist had to offer for him. He ended up feeling smug, as if he had somehow cracked a code, but it didn’t seem as if it fazed Amra.

“I don’t really want to do that, either. Not really — I’m fine with who I am. You know that, right? I just need to find other people who are fine with that too.”

Amra lifted his hand to his own face, stroking the side of it as he thought. Maybe for too long he had let David coast, but there was an issue he wanted to press on to.

“So if you could, hypothetically, change your experience as a kid when you were sick and all, would you not do that?”

There was just the faintest of laughs. It was high pitched and far too amused. 

“I can’t live my whole life around that.”

“Wouldn't you say it defined you, in a way?”

“Would you say that it did?”

“Trying to find out how you feel about it. I know you signed the stuff for me to get your old doctor’s information a while back, but, I finally got it and managed to really pour over it. I’m here to try and help you cope with life, so, I think your early life really does help define you. You can change the definition, yeah, but you have to spend the time working on it.”

Ah, yes, he had nearly forgotten about that agreement they had worked out. For the longest time David hadn’t even told him about any medical records, because, well, he wasn’t a doctor and it was medical, not mental. Not that he thought there was something quite wrong with him mentally, but after his supervisors insisted he seek counseling or possibly be fired, that’s when he was connected to Amra.

It just hadn’t seemed relevant, for so long, and he found it comical that it seemed so important now. 

“You mind if I get those papers out?”

“Go ahead.”

It sort of unnerved him when he saw that Amra had them waiting by his desk in a manilla legal sized envelope. Soon enough he pulled out papers that he could see were bereft with writing and scribbles all over in different colored pens, and even some highlighted areas of text. As he watched him scan over them, he thought about something.

“What happened to that eyepatch? Weren’t you wearing it just two weeks ago?”

“Ahh — I don’t need it right now.”

“Is it not some defining, important part of you?”

He got quite the look out of him for that, but he felt the need to prod and provoke at the moment. 

“The impression I got here is that you told me the truth. In pieces, at least. You had allergies so they gave you steroids, but they did that all the time, which got your immune system all angry and not working right because it packed up and left thinking it didn’t have a job still. So you got meningitis, your meninges were all infected from a fungus, and with that and the medicine they used to treat you…”

“You can tell me about your eye. It’s not too friendly or whatever. You know, I actually had really good luck with my eyes. I have some uncle and his eyes are nearly blind, he can see shapes and it’s all gray and stuff. Guess it wasn’t genetic though.”

He was trying to ignore the sound of the papers being shuffled around. He knew that he wasn’t going to yank a reaction out of him, but he still had to try, right? 

The silence frustrated him in to speaking again.

“You know… Yeah, I know what conclusion they think they came to, but brain damage sounds really harsh.”

It had always felt like an insult more than a classification to him. Instead of a term that was supposed to define some changes, it was a term that would change how people thought of him if they knew just two words that could be part of a definition of his biochemistry. He didn’t need that sort of stigmatization. Part of why he moved instead of staying where he had been born and raised was the idea of blending in. 

The sort of place where nobody knows your name, if you wanted to put it that way.

“And I live just fine. A lot of people have worse things, they have it a lot worse. I’m not some drooling invalid, I’m a smart person. I’m very capable and nobody gives me credit for that enough.”

“It goes past that. From what I understand, that's just one aspect of it. You’re fine in most ways, but what it did have an effect on says a lot about how you present and carry yourself. With these… larger than life tales, sometimes.”

“Well! Then we know for sure there’s not a damn thing I can do. So, same time next week?”

“The way it makes you feel alone, like, we can work on that.”

Although he sort of didn’t want to say it directly, he figured maybe he might as well come out and be blunt about it. He didn’t have to repeat everything that was on his mind, but perhaps they both had made enough progress that his statement wasn’t going to run David off entirely.

“Now that I know at least some certain things in specific are true, we can work on… interpersonal skills.”

Most of the things David talked about would always be positive things — the times they weren’t, they shadowed his past as someone who seemed to feel neglected and alone for quite some time. There definitely was some sort of medical neglect, whether intentional or not, and from these files Amra could feel someone who was always sickly and tried to be heard only for things to not work out and it culminating in a crash that marked the rest of his life.

He had a few times spun some incredible tales about medical history, but knowing what was real or not, he finally felt he had the proper leg up that he should have as his counselor. 

“Well that’s… great, but I thought we were kinda doing that all along. Guess I’ll find out from you more next time.”

“Bit anxious to get a move on?”

“Actually? Just a bit.”

With that he went ahead and stood up. He stepped ahead and placed a hand on Amra’s shoulder, not even attempting to give a pleasant smile. He felt bothered, ruffled up, all because it felt someone knew more about him now that maybe he knew about himself.

“I’ll see you next time. And next time, I’m gonna go find someone to go do something with, since you and I aren’t friends, right?”

“Alright… I hope that goes well for you. I’m serious.”

The almost pitied feeling made him feel nauseous. 

He needed to be himself, his actual self, meaning not David. After all, if everything he said and surrounded himself with was a lie, then his real self would naturally be fake just like everything else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god damn I have no excuses  
> anyway I have a tumblrz you should check out - youare256colors . tryin' to... idk. idk, anyway. here this is. I know usually I'd go off on a huge tangent about the background here but... heh. thanks!!


	7. Matt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's messy, it's emotional, and it's rather dramatic. It's tuesday night.

Having insomnia was true suffering. He was always so unbelievably tired.

This Tuesday was one of those nights where he felt half dead. He could continue to drink coffee, but that would only contribute to his feelings of dehydration that left him feeling like a husk. 

It was rather cheesy, but sitting in a support group feeling this groggy and out of it, the situation brought the plot of Fight Club to his mind. Feeling like a 'copy of a copy' when you had insomnia. 

But the support group didn't make him be able to sleep afterward, and he wasn't thrilled at the idea of pulling a Tyler Durden and creating a cult to try and commit terrorist acts in an attempt to bring down the capitalist society they lived in. 

The glare of the room's lighting made him feel depressed. Right now, sitting in this circle of people that was filling up quickly, it just… made him feel depressed. Even the warmth of the coffee in his hand didn't make him feel anything.

He tried for just one moment to shut his eyes. It was as if he could hear his own blood coursing through his veins and stifling his ears. 

When Joe was ready to head up the group, he grabbed one of the hard, uncomfortable chairs and flipped it around, sitting on it backwards. Matthew looked over at him, too tired to make a quip about the fact he looked like some hip counselor from the early 90's who was trying to connect with today's youth, especially as he grabbed the back of the chair.

"So, anyone have anything that they want to talk about tonight?"

It was as if everyone chose that moment to look around at one another. The counselor always had some sort of additional topic to discuss, just in case, but sometimes if it served purpose the usual ebb and flow of conversation could be more than enough. It was a fairly opinionated group, after all. 

"I guess I could say something."

Most of the heads in the room turned to _her_ , the older Asian woman of the group. Matt himself tried to not prematurely grimace, but there was a certain unfortunate sadness he felt just being around her. He could remember so clearly back when he knew her with natural colored dark hair, rather than the purple ombre of today. 

Mari looked a bit tired. She could draw the eyes of an entire room with her looks if she wanted to, but she much more often chose to blend in to that same room.

"I've just been kind of pissed off lately. I'm not happy with what I'm doing. I want to do more, and I understand there's limitations, but I used to feel pretty limitless."

"Limitless was a pretty crappy movie." 

Joshua mentioned, not even bothering to keep it under his breath. Nobody paid much attention to him though, since his off handed comments were a fairly usual thing. 

"It's still the dancing that you wish you could be doing?"

Joe had easily been able to bring exactly what Mari meant to the forefront. She wasn't one to whine and moan, but dancing had really been her passion before the wreck that had happened.

It brought the grimace Matt had been hiding immediately to the forefront. It always did. The dancing was always the complaint and the ultimate answer.

"Yeah, and I know it's old news, but it was just a really crap week. I like teaching, but I know I'm not as happy."

"It was an accident."

The words just slipped out Matt's mouth. It was as if by doing so that he immediately felt most eyes fall on him instead, but he clasped his hands together and decided that he would try to deal with the rest of the time in silence. Looking up at the solitary clock on the dingy wall, he only had a full hour of it to survive, after all.

"I'm not even going to say anything to you about it. It's over with, it's the past, it can't be changed. I can't just remove having pins put in my stupid hip. Just let me have this."

Now he really was resigned to just stay quiet. He could feel his face burning as he frowned. Luckily, as a good mediator does, the counselor tried to gently ease in.

"I think a lot of the times when we deal with illness, we deal with pain, we deal with anything that stops us… We end up dealing with mourning. A lot of people think mourning is only something to happen after a loss like a death, but it can be any kind of loss."

He spoke so surely of his words. Most of the group still seemed jittery and on edge from the comments of their fellow members, sans the few that had no idea the meaning behind it all.

"For example, it's the loss of who you were as a person. When we can't reach our potential because of forces out of our control, that's one thing. We mourn it because we'll never know. What you're dealing with here, in some ways, it's already worse since you already had known."

From the listening crowd, a voice came forth. 

"You were a dancer."

Noah stated, his long fingers clutching a pen. He had been trying to scribble down some of the counselor's words and advice, but actually listening to the human condition had him silently surprised.

"She was -- she's amazing. She won a lot of awards."

For just once, Olivia had spoken up, stopping herself short of saying she had admired the dance routines Mari would do before as a dancer herself, before Mari could speak back up.

"Yeah… Like she said. I was doing ballet ever since I could remember. I fell in love with everything about it. It was when things started to feel like I was just going through the motions that I was in a car accident that messed things up. And I've gotten over that, but this week was just hard."

"It had to be a pretty bad accident."

"Two years ago," Matt murmured very quietly. He didn't have physical scars from it, but he'd never gotten over it. Sometimes life just included hearing about it over and over.

"It's not even about that. He -- the person driving -- didn't mean it."

Just because he fell asleep didn't mean it was malicious. It didn't entirely make it not his fault though, either. It had struck such a deep chord of paranoia and fear in him regarding sleep, however, that it had taken the problems that were only first blossoming at the time and really drove it over the edge. 

A metaphorical edge, anyhow. Different from falling asleep just long enough to drift into the other lane, waking to a scream and the ungodly sound of metal and flesh crushing together. If sleep was out of the equation, there wasn't a chance to wake up to something like that again.

"Now, maybe it's me, but it sounds like it wasn't your fault, then?" Mari looked to Shayne instead, who had been sitting nearby him. The blank look on her face was enough confirmation for him to continue. "So it was probably someone you trusted. I just have to say but when you trust someone like that, and then they just rip out your heart and irrevocably change your life… that sucks."

"Man! Nobody cheated on you."

The sudden exclamation seemed to shock literally everyone except Shayne, who just seemed to glare over at the offending source - Keith. He didn't seem intent on just stopping there, either.

"You think he cheated on you just because of how you read some stupid text. We tried telling you the whole story, but you don't even _listen_! That's on you."

"I didn't even say anything about it." 

Shayne retorted smoothly, in a tone that seemed to point to the fact he knew what he had been doing and trying to stir up.

Matt managed to look over to Noah, noticing the teen seemed to be shoving his notebook back into his bag. In a way, he was sort of thankful -- what an unexpected distraction this turned out to be, after all. It was quite lively.

He wasn't the only one to notice Noah's motions, either. Amra spoke up, directed at Noah in a painfully obvious way.

"Are you two dating?"

The younger Jewish boy of the group looked absolutely mortified to be singled out. He had been trying not to garner any attention, but sometimes that's just how things were.

"You two actually met here and thought it'd be a good idea to date from that? I'd love to just say, you know, love is love, no helping it there, but there is already a lot of that going on in here and it's not the healthiest thing ever."

"I don't know if dating is really an accurate way to describe us at the current moment," Shayne butted back in, still with the same matter-of-fact look on his face. 

"I'm not even gay, I don't want your boyfriend. You're being such a stubborn, pretty boy asshole."

"Okay!"

Joe clapped both of his hands together in a grand effort to get the group's attention. It was just jarringly loud enough to, even over all the prior arguing and the look on Shayne's face as if he could just really go for murder at the moment from the comment.

He was the type of man to speak with his hands when excited, and so he got to business gesturing around the room.

"It seems like a lot of this that's going on," he pointed one hand out towards Shayne, and the other in the direction of Keith and Noah before drawing them back to the center, "has nothing to do with what was going on before." He gestured to the group as a whole. "I think that it'd be maybe more appropriate for that discussion," Joe waved his hand back to Shayne, "to maybe have a place outside of here. It seems like it's maybe a bit private. Maybe, even, a bit counter productive. Your problems are valid, but it's just not exactly couples therapy here."

Joshua leaned forward in his seat, furrowing his brow. With the same sort of devil's advocate streak in him as shared by many others, he spoke again with the purpose of being heard this time.

"I thought it was Matt and Mari who were dating when the car wreck happened. He was even driving, right?"

He didn't even lean back in his chair after he spoke, choosing to stare over at the guy he had just called out instead. With a look that seemed like he just tasted sour milk on accident, Matt kept his reply rather short.

"You're such an asshole."

"He always has been," Wes murmured just audibly enough. This entire time, he hadn't seemed phased or surprised in the least. Maybe he hadn't even really been paying attention.

It was still Mari who had felt the most from this derailment. There had been no way to tell prior that it would veer so badly off topic, and she had been so wary and worried to even say anything in the first place. It really wasn't her fault, given that Shayne would have taken any topic and twisted it however necessary to get to what he wanted to talk about -- there had just been no way for her to know that would happen.

She sighed to herself, casting a cautious glance towards Matt's current girlfriend. She hadn't ever really gotten along with Courtney, but there had never been anything for the two to say between themselves. That's why it was surprising to hear her speak up.

"Sometimes when a person says they've had a bad week, it doesn't mean there's any reason to dissect everything behind it. Sometimes you just have a bad time, and that just sucks."

She gave a sympathetic look to Mari, who decided to nod along with the sentiment. It was just steam that needed blown off -- Joe had covered it well with the idea behind mourning. From Courtney's statement, he did begin to speak again, hoping that the chaos was over with.

"We're taught so many things from the time that we're young. We take in all these ideals and morals without even realizing how it's going to shape us as a person. So sometimes, the route that we've always known can feel like the only one. There's more out there to life. At times we just have to take a break from finding a new path to acknowledge it really sucks the old one closed." 

Matt did his best to keep his snarky little sigh to himself. 

Luckily, the rest of the time wasn't nearly as energized as the outbursts had been. Such emotional turmoil just happened sometimes with this group of people. He really had no idea what the whole story was behind what had just happened, and he really had no desire to know either. 

The quite strange culmination in events had him thinking back to something he had heard before. A very integral part of the Fight Club he felt he had trapped himself in related to the main character's belief that support groups were this wonderful thing, because people actually truly listened -- rather than waiting for their chance to speak.

Maybe it was just the people he was around, but they surely weren't like that.

He had noticed toward the end, however, the very strange fact that there had been silence the entire time from David. It wasn't as if the guy was doing anything else even, not even distracted by a pen or seemingly any conversation.

It was for that reason that when it was said and done, that he was ready to leave, that when he passed by the bright orange haired guy that he waved his hand and said a quick casual bye to him.

Keeping with the theme of being caught off guard, he hadn't expected anything back but he sure did receive a surprise.

"Hey, yeah, bye and all that, but just a quick question -- do you ever go by Mike?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I won't have this done by the end of the year lmao. It's tragic how long this has been unfinished. maybe by the end of 2018, eh? I'll be writing this til I die. I have two other things planned to post before the end of this year, though. one is a new chapter of cure for death (which is nearly finished. the entire story, that is. that's nearly done. it's strange, but if you're bored, go give it a read and some love). the other is a whole new tacky shaymien romance/drama oneshot. 
> 
> hopefully along with continuing this, 2018 will be the year of serial killers. enough said there.
> 
> for some tiny reassurance, I do have pretty much a whole set of notes, etc, even an ending for this story that I've known I've wanted since the start. THAT SAID, there is most definitely some wiggle room. if I haven't focused on folks before and you'd like me to, let me know. for (obvious) reasons I kinda want to dive into Keith, next. while I wish I could go back and do things like the fact I'm in love with the whole wes & joven meeting online thing, flashback type stuff, if I ever truly feel it, may end up in a whole new collection of stuff. that would actually be rather neat... just a collection of connected flashback oneshots... 
> 
> anyhow, so yeah. if you have anyone that makes you kinda hmmmm, let me know. I don't even exactly imagine this story doubling in length from here on out. we're not at the end, but since everything has been tangled up, it'll need to get unraveled, right?
> 
> ah, that said, if you've read this as of late and wondered about boze and/or damien - because of when this was written and everything previously written in this work, the answer is no.
> 
> anyway and just a big shoutout to r_sublett who began encouraging me to write before I said who I was and that I do indeed already write. that really helped spur all this fic writing lately, I believe. thank you so much for being great like that.
> 
> and thank you to any other remaining readers.

**Author's Note:**

> If you or anyone you know may be suffering from any mental roadblock you may see, please seek help, even just reaching out to a friend.


End file.
